Is perfect form in bowling needed for good games?

[Hammer]

I like watching Beat the Champ bowling. The bowlers are not pros but they are good bowlers. You will see all kinds of styles that bowlers have. There is one guy that gets on the show often and if you see him bowl you would wonder how he has such a high average and can get a lot of strikes. He is one of the best bowlers on the show.

His name is Chuck Jagodzinski. If you watch him bowl when he makes his approach and goes into his release he is flailing with his arms and looks like he is going to fall onto the lane. He does this every time. The first time I saw him I couldn't believe it. He never changes his style and keeps doing what he is doing. He isn't even close to bowling with the right form. To him his form works for him so why change anything.

He has long winning streaks on the show Beat the Champ. A lot of the bowlers on the show like to have a chance to bowl him to see if they can beat him. They have to qualify to get on the show. This guy shoots down the idea that you need good form to be a good bowler. I am sure that his form probably wouldn't work on pro bowler patterns. So if you get the chance watch Beat the Champ on Youtube. Youtube will show different dates for this show and Chuck Jagodzinski is on a lot of them. He has been on the show a long time.

[boatman37]

We have a guy with bad knees that has about a 205 average. He takes 2 baby steps beside the ball return then lets the ball go about 6 or 7' before the foul line and is very good with it. Noe how high would his average be if he was able to have a more traditional approach? Who knows.

[J Anderson]

There is no such thing as perfect form in bowling. While coaches recommend certain things like a four step approach that make it easier to deliver the ball consistently, no two bowlers will execute a shot in exactly the same manner. What matters in this came is being able to repeat shots reasonably well and find the right line to play on the lane. Watching this bowler his approach seems mostly normal until he gets to the line and folds over at the waist. This causes him to lose balance and flail around, however the ball has already left his hand by then. I’m sure that someone has probably told him that he’s losing leverage, but who’s going to listen to criticism when they keep on striking.

[SRB57]

I like watching Beat the Champ bowling. The bowlers are not pros but they are good bowlers. You will see all kinds of styles that bowlers have. There is one guy that gets on the show often and if you see him bowl you would wonder how he has such a high average and can get a lot of strikes. He is one of the best bowlers on the show.

His name is Chuck Jagodzinski. If you watch him bowl when he makes his approach and goes into his release he is flailing with his arms and looks like he is going to fall onto the lane. He does this every time. The first time I saw him I couldn't believe it. He never changes his style and keeps doing what he is doing. He isn't even close to bowling with the right form. To him his form works for him so why change anything.

He has long winning streaks on the show Beat the Champ. A lot of the bowlers on the show like to have a chance to bowl him to see if they can beat him. They have to qualify to get on the show. This guy shoots down the idea that you need good form to be a good bowler. I am sure that his form probably wouldn't work on pro bowler patterns. So if you get the chance watch Beat the Champ on Youtube. Youtube will show different dates for this show and Chuck Jagodzinski is on a lot of them. He has been on the show a long time.

I live in the Buffalo area and watch a lot of the beat the champ shows. The person you mentioned does the same thing every time which is key to high scores ands he gets plenty. I watch a lot of the bowlers in my area with styles you would not think would work but they bowl 800's and 300's. I feel I have a pretty good game but unable to score like these guys. Like I said if you can repeat shots you can shoot high scores especially on the house shots of today. Steve

[Phonetek]

"Perfect form" is the equivalent of muffler bearings for a car, it doesn't exist, never has. I just had this conversation with a parent who has a kid on my son's team. He's an arrogant guy but a decent bowler. He said his kids form was perfect. His kid is a very smooth one hand lefty. He's okay, I'd say a "classic" or old school what we would call a "textbook" approach.

When he steps up, he clearly doesn't look like an open bowler who looks like an idiot. He looks like a bowler. Perfect? I think not, however I just said "Yep, very nice" and moved on. No sense in arguing with him, he's far too egotistical to bother.

I classify myself the same in that I follow most of the recommended methods in my stance, steps, knee bend and follow through from the old school method of teachings. I said MOST. I do plant at the line, my crossover step sucks, I'm late on my release among other things. Still, you can clearly see I learned long ago following the textbook ways of old. I am able to repeat it consistently. I'm far from perfect, I just clearly look like a bowler. Simple as that.

That said, that isn't "perfect" and nobody has ever been perfect. If God himself decided to pick up a bowling ball then maybe we'd see what perfect is. Until then we'll see a bazillion different styles where even something we see as wrong works perfectly for them. In that case, is what they are doing really WRONG? There is no definitive answer.

With bowling you don't need to be perfect, right or wrong. You just have to be able to do the same thing whatever is working for you over and over and over the same way. Everyone has their own vision in their head of what perfect is, none of them is 100% right. Some work better than others.

[Aslan]

Mark Baker's video that came out not too long ago broke it down differently.

It wasn't about "perfect forms"...it was about parts of a bowler's setup, approach, and release that were similar to Hall of Fame bowlers. So, if you look at a person's stance, approach, and release...you can compare different parts of it to these elements that most hall of fame bowlers all have in common. If you do those things...it's almost guaranteed you will be a very good bowler. If you're not doing those things, it's probably why you're not a very good bowler.

Now, there are variations from bowler to bowler...because a young bowler is going to be different than an old bowler. A female bowler is going to be different than a male bowler. But, no matter what kind of bowler you are...you can still compare these certain spots in your game to these "Hall fo Fame Positions" (or whatever he called them) to see if you were doing things right or wrong.

It's an interesting video.

[Phonetek]

I agree in that there are aspects of every form that if they if the conform to a certain way that yes they would be considered "correct". If you put all the "correct" movements together for every step along the way you could probably come up with a somewhat "perfect" form. I don't believe it would actually be just ONE perfect form to come out of it, most likely many versions. Which of those would be the perfect one? Who's to say?

I personally just try my best to be smooth and not try to make any herky jerky movements and stay balanced. Not to many bad things can happen being smooth and balanced, Perfection is within the eye of the beholder, it's not anything official and really can't be.

[Hammer]

I live in the Buffalo area and watch a lot of the beat the champ shows. The person you mentioned does the same thing every time which is key to high scores ands he gets plenty. I watch a lot of the bowlers in my area with styles you would not think would work but they bowl 800's and 300's. I feel I have a pretty good game but unable to score like these guys. Like I said if you can repeat shots you can shoot high scores especially on the house shots of today. Steve

Did you ever actually go to any of these Beat the Champ tournaments in your area to see them bowl live? One of the top bowlers on that show besides Chuck Jagodzinski is Mike Zarcone. I watch that show on Youtube quite a bit. You can watch different years of that show.

[SRB57]

Did you ever actually go to any of these Beat the Champ tournaments in your area to see them bowl live? One of the top bowlers on that show besides Chuck Jagodzinski is Mike Zarcone. I watch that show on Youtube quite a bit. You can watch different years of that show.

I would go and try out for beat the champ back a long time ago (early 80's). I almost made the cut a couple of times. I never went to a taping so never got to see these guys live. Like I said its about repeating. I watch the video clips of people throwing 800's and 300's all the time and they look pretty bad form wise but do it multiple times. Steve

[boomer]

That guy is nothin. His approach is actually decent - it's just his balance is all off after release so he windmills.

Look at Butturf. :O

I can't remember his name but he's a higher-end bowler around here in the Inland Empire. He's a two-handed bowler, bald, thick glasses. He, like, has his ball in two hands, starts approach, bobs the ball up and down twice, contorts, then lofts the ball. INCREDIBLY awkward, utterly unique, very strange, and yet he's consistent. He did well at the USBC Open when he bowled on my pair. If we lined up opposite, I had to let him go first or I'd be distracted. . . I'll ask my PSO what his name is and try to see if there's any video.